Soloed Saw no other climbers. Given the good class 3 climbing its surprising that Whorl does not see more traffic. Based on the summit register, I was only the third party summiting this year. While the mountain is daunting when seen from below, the three chute system ascending the SE face makes the route feasible. The challenge is to enter in the correct chute and then to traverse into chutes 2 and 3. Like a lot of climbers I started too high and gained chute 2 which has better rock but is more difficult in the beginning than chute 1. Chute 1 is to the climber's left and has more talus and scree. SP's route description is excellent and one need only be patient in traversing to the south of the mountain to gain the entry chute number 1.

Great climb, perfect weather! Thanks to MWetters for the great routefinding and encouragement. They should really just make one trail out there--it would be way less damaging to the environment, and a lot easier on climbers. :-)

Monty, Mike Riepe, and I climbed the SE Face route yesterday, after camping out near Horse Creek Pass. The weather was gloomy but the climb was fun. Thanks to Richard Steele for the excellent route description.

Etsuko (my girlfriend), Matthew and I started this as a day-hike from the Twin Lakes parking lot at 6am. Weather forecasters predicted mostly sunny day with 20% precipitation. In my opinion, these people should be "shot" :). Approximately half way up, clouds rolled in and it started raining. At this point, Etsuko decided that getting soaked and cold (we only brought very light clothes with us) is not worth it for her and she turned back while Matthew and I (with the trash bag over me for the water protection) pressed on hoping for the best. As we got to the Horse Creek pass, weather seemed to hold and improved for the better. Hopeful, we continued to traverse around the peak in order to get into the chutes. I was relieved to finally start climbing after the long approach. Chute #1 was quite loose and not very fun. As we were reaching its top, it started raining again. This time rain was short and we resumed into the chute #2. This is where the real fun begins! We quickly made our way to the chute #3 on excellent rock, found the 'easy sandy traverse' (per Bob Burd) and squeezed ourselves under the infamous chokestone. As we gained the summit ridge, weather turned really bad again. We waited for a half an hour under the hailstorm and thunder in the narrow chimney ~100 feet below the summit. Fortunately weather gave us a chance and cleared out for 15 minutes, just enough for us to tag the summit and run back down. After getting hailed/rained on (again) near the Horse Creek pass on the way down, we safely made it back to the car at 7:30pm, with the last light.

Day 1 of the 2002 Mountaineers Challenge. Dayhiking from Twin Lakes, 5 of us made it to the summit under beatiful weather (though the views were a bit smokey) in a little over 6hrs. Exciting class 3 climbing up chute #2 since we didn't traverse far enough to reach the class 2 chute #1. Trip Report.